Best Biophysics
Robert O. Becker, a pioneer in the filed of regeneration and its relationship to electrical currents in living things, challenges the established mechanistic understanding of the body. Robert O. Becker, M.D., lived in upstate New York.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Western and Eastern Esoterisicm for centuries has taught, both subtly and obviously, that our bodies, our planet, our solar system, and our universe are essentially circuits. I love this book because it speaks our modern-day language and brings ancient, esoteric conceptions down to a level most people can at least attempt to grasp. It sounds like science fiction now ... 3) Peer review is flawed and riddled with sleazy people who steal ideas and find ways to back stab. This really isn't new information if you work in the "publish or perish" workforce, but it's refreshing to see another brave soul blow the horn on this bureaucratic creature from the black lagoon that repeatedly gets love letters from universities across the globe. If you stand outside the status quo in your thinking, you are thrown out, your research is stolen, and somebody privately uses the results to produce things for self-serving industries."
"I first read this as a library book after seeing it cited in many a bibliography, and quickly realized that I must own a copy for my own collection. The Body Electric is considered a classic in the field of bio-field research, and for good reason: Becker was one of the first to realize that our bodies are semiconductors of electricity."
"We can make our own Organic Dietary Silica Powder (as a liquid) by adding a trace amount of silver. I learned this by testing upon my own body some of the knowledge resulting from the research of Dr. Robert O. Becker, MD, an orthopedic surgeon and professor of same, who has a patent for wound care: United States patent # 5814094, and a book: The Body Electric: Electromagnetism And The Foundation Of Life. Orthosilicic acid nourishes the body to stimulate its production of collagen - connective tissue. When trace silver is present, collagen forms stem cells at the skin and pericardial sac surrounding the heart resulting in spontaneous regeneration of whatever is deficient within the body of greatest need. In a Circleware Circle 64 oz Pitcher, add distilled water, low magnesium earth salt (such as extra fine The Spice Lab's Pure Himalayan Salt - 10 Pounds - Finely Ground .5mm - not sea salt), Diatomaceous Earth Food Grade 10 Lb, and optionally a bicarbonate of either 1 lb USP Pure Sodium Bicarbonate Powder Highest Quality Food Grade Pure Baking Soda or Potassium Bicarbonate - 1 lb. Cut and shape two electrodes out of LifeForce 72" Colloidal Silver Generator Wire 9999 Pure 14 Gauge to overhang into the pitcher along opposite sides all the way to the bottom, and form a tiny curl at the bottom end so as to avoid scratching the inside surface of the glass. Run the colloidal silver generator on its lowest setting continuously for a few days and make sure your machine is capable of stirring the solution. EarthWorksHealth.com >> diatomaceous earth, food grade. [...]. Hanna Instruments HI 770 Checker HC Handheld Colorimeter, For Silica High Range. Dr. Becker has a patent for the use of silver in wound care at this location: [...]. Also see the photo documentation of Dr. Pramod Vora who has replicated one of Dr. Becker's treatment methods: space-age.com. There is also a clinic in Australia which has been successful in treating cancer with Becker's technique: [...]. My effort at researching Dr. Becker: [...]. Apart from drinking beer, there are very few conventional options in the standard western diet for supplementing ourselves with bioavailable silica for promoting collagen production in the human and animal body. When combined with minute quantities of silver (acting as a catalytic binding agent to collagen), bioavailable silica stimulates the production of non-differentiated (stem) cells at the growth layer of the skin and at the pericardial sac (surrounding the heart) supplementing whatever level of stem cells are already being produced by our bone marrow. - PubMed - NCBI. [...]. Silicon deprivation decreases collagen formation in wounds and bone, and ornithine transaminase enzyme activity in liver. - PubMed - NCBI. [...]. The only caveat to the regeneration of the body is the tendency for regeneration to drain the body of its alkaline reserve. Thus, is needed: silica to balance the body's pH plus plenty of alkalizing supplements and methods, such as: the magnesium and calcium products cited above or others (such as: Bone Meal Kal 250 Tabs and magnesium malate or citrate), Starwest Botanicals Organic Kelp Powder, 1 Pound Bags,Celtic Sea Salt, Fine Ground, 16 Ounce and electrolyte powder, Sleep Lavender Bath Salts 2 Lbs, etc. I think bioavailable silica plus trace silver (in any form) holds the key to my recovery."
The term “complexity” can be misleading, however, because what makes West’s discoveries so beautiful is that he has found an underlying simplicity that unites the seemingly complex and diverse phenomena of living systems, including our bodies, our cities and our businesses. Furthermore, the efficiency of the mammal’s circulatory systems scales up precisely based on weight: if you compare a mouse, a human and an elephant on a logarithmic graph, you find with every doubling of average weight, a species gets 25% more efficient—and lives 25% longer. The implications of these discoveries are far-reaching, and are just beginning to be explored. “Scale. , a grand synthesis of topics [Geoffrey West] has studied for several decades, makes an important and eloquent case for the significance [of universal laws of size and growth] in an ecology of the natural and human world — and in understanding whether the two can fit together.” — Nature. “West’s insightful analysis and astute observations patiently build an intellectual framework that is ultimately highly rewarding, offering a new perspective on the many scales with which nature and society challenge us…A fascinating journey.” – Science Magazine. By the end of the book, readers will understand such oddments as why it is that the hearts of all animals, from mouse to elephant, beat roughly the same number of times across a lifespan and why the pace of life increases so markedly as the population grows (which explains why people walk faster, it turns out, in big cities than out in the countryside) …Illuminating and entertaining—heady science written for a lay readership, bringing scaling theory and kindred ideas to a large audience.”— Kirkus Reviews. If you want to know why companies fail, how cities persist and what is needed to sustain our civilization in this era of rapid innovation, read this amazing book.”. — Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce “When Geoffrey West, a brilliant theoretical physicist, turned his lens to the study of life spans, biological systems or cities he stumbled onto a game-changing universal insight about growth and sustainability. Scale is dazzling and provocative and West proves himself to be a compelling and entertaining writer—this is a book we will be talking about for a long time.”. — Abraham Verghese, author of Cutting for Stone “If there were a Nobel Prize for transdisciplinary science Geoffrey West would have won it for the work covered in Scale . If you are curious about how the world really works, you must read this book.”. — Bill Miller, Chairman, Emeritus, Sante Fe Institute “Geoffrey West’s Scale is a revelation. Like the best detective story, West lays out the amazing challenge of understanding why animals, cities and companies all scale so uniformly and then skillfully lets us into the secrets that his detective work has uncovered. We accompany the author on his quest to face up to his own mortality while at the same time being exposed to the theoretical discoveries that West has pioneered in his groundbreaking work.” —Marcus du Sautoy, Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University and author of The Great Unknown “It’s rare in the history of science that someone has a big, bold, beautiful, stunningly simple new idea that also turns out to be right.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"I received an advance uncorrected copy, so perhaps some of the issues will be corrected in the final version, but the flaws run deeper than typographic. But the vertical scale runs from population of 10,000 to 3.2 billion, 4.5 orders of magnitude, and that dwarfs the variation in patents per capita so things look linear. But it turns out that does not support the linearity the author of book claims, the whole point of the chart is to show that larger cities have more patents per capita than smaller ones, and says explicitly that the relation is non-linear. A better chart shows metabolic rate versus weight (here labeled "mass" despite being the same scale as the previous graph). This is key, because a lot of things also go up with powers of mass and people disagree on which ones of them are important for setting the metabolic rate. Finally, there is a chart purporting to show that net income and assets of companies are linear in log-log space with number of employees. Also in the first few pages, the author is hyperventilating about the "exponential rate of urbanization" that has increased the proportion of US residents who live in cities from 4% 200 years ago to 80% today and is an "impending tsunami with the potential to overwhelm us." Urbanization in the US since 1790 fits a near perfect Gompertz trend with an asymptote at about 83% (that doesn't mean I predict urbanization will stabilize at 83%, drawing curves from the past is a dangerous way to predict the future, but at least a curve that fits the data is better than one that is clearly inconsistent with the data). Another wildly false scare sentence is, "It is only relatively recently that we have become conscious of global warming, long-term environmental changes, limitations on energy, water, and other resources, health and pollution issues, stability of financial markets, and so on." The ancient Romans griped and sued about gravioris caeli and infamis aer, and Seneca wrote “No sooner had I left behind the oppressive atmosphere of. [Rome] and that reek of smoking cookers which pour out, along with clouds of ashes, all the poisonous fumes they’ve accumulated in their interiors whenever they’re started up, that I noticed the change in my condition.” Pollution has been a major political issue in Europe for nearly 1,000 years. The book gets quite a bit better when it leaves off the foolishness of the beginning and discusses specific topics with precision and insight. The notes are not as helpful as they should be, few of them have any explanation, many are just names of authors or books with no clue about how to find the specific support for the cited claim. There is not a clear distinction between patterns that occur for mathematical reasons--things like Fibonacci numbers, inverse square laws, Gompertz trends, fractal scaling and power laws--versus mathematical patterns that result from top down constraints."
"Compared with the multitude of research in business and finance, the study of company or industry "demographics" is negligible. I believe there may be discoverable general principles, including mathematical ones, underlying the rise and fall of companies and industries. I think trying to understand companies from massive averaged datasets, without looking at the actual facts, is a slippery slope. Sometimes companies (like Sears) change names, sometimes they reincorporate, sometimes they are acquired but are in effect the surviving corporations. I imagine the book's approach might be much more successful (and insightful) had the author studied products or industries rather than companies. Data on the production of commodities (from steel to education to rail freight) are readily available. And ultimately all companies (and the economy at large) are built on the rise and fall of buggy whips and smartphones."
"It is full of fascinating observations and insights about biology, society, urban living, companies, and the future of society."
""life will continue to speed up and urbanization remain the dominant force as we head toward an impending singularity."
"The book could have delivered all the information in half the time, if not substantially less than that, with more editing and more focus."
Biological Physics is built around a self-contained core geared toward undergraduate students who have had one year of calculus-based physics. Philip Nelson is Professor of Physics at the University of Pennsylvania.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Biological Physics by Philip Nelson manages to connect a physicist to relevant names and problems in biology, and a biologist to the methods and tools of physics. Physical Biochemistry by van Holde is a classic text that can be used in conjunction with this text."
"The book is a clear survey of statistical physics applied to biology, discussing how organisms use molecular machines driven by chemical differences in contrast to more familiar machines driven by temperature differences. The book is mainly self-contained in both the physics and biology, and provides interesting connections between those fields."
"This is a great book for students who really want to learn some real biophysics."
"Great book."
"It does not break new ground but does cover in one place topics that should be familiar to anyone studying quantitative biology."
"I wanted more but still this is great as a primer."
"the book gives a physical basis of science and how to understand it using layman examples and experiments."
"Despite being a text book, I actually read this cover to cover."
Best Electron Microscopes & Microscopy
This text provides students as well as practitioners with a comprehensive introduction to the field of scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray microanalysis. “There is no other single volume that covers as much theory and practice of SEM or X-ray microanalysis as Scanning Electron Microscopy and X-ray Microanalysis, 3rd Edition does. It is an excellent textbook for graduate students, and an outstanding reference for engineers, physical, and biological scientists.” (Microscopy and Microanalysis, Vol.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"This book has greatly exceeded my expectations and has impressed me with the technical content."
"Before you grab your solid-state physics book or check Wikipedia, just relax and page through it since this book pretty much makes it easy for you. It's compact compared to the monsterous Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) book by Barry Carter which is another great reference."
"I'm reading this book and an older edition of the Reimer text for in independent study course in SEM. There are many instances where there are sets of images to compare the results achieved with varied operating parameters."
"this book is excellent and a basis still after many years."
"A great hardcover book at a very reasonable price!"
"Great reference for Scanning electron microscopy."
"fast delivery, just as advertised."
"Includes all the basic terms and features than one is needed when begins electron microscopy, but also for the experienced ones to look back at various troubles they come up with during the use of SEM or XRD."
Best Biology
Now an HBO® Film starring Oprah Winfrey and Rose Byrne #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER. Her name was Henrietta Lacks, but scientists know her as HeLa. Amazon Best Books of the Month, February 2010 : From a single, abbreviated life grew a seemingly immortal line of cells that made some of the most crucial innovations in modern science possible. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival--left them full of pride, anger, and suspicion. Jad Abumrad is host and creator of the public radio hit Radiolab , now in its seventh season and reaching over a million people monthly. Just the simple facts are hard to believe: that in 1951, a poor black woman named Henrietta Lacks dies of cervical cancer, but pieces of the tumor that killed her--taken without her knowledge or consent--live on, first in one lab, then in hundreds, then thousands, then in giant factories churning out polio vaccines, then aboard rocket ships launched into space. The cells from this one tumor would spawn a multi-billion dollar industry and become a foundation of modern science--leading to breakthroughs in gene mapping, cloning and fertility and helping to discover how viruses work and how cancer develops (among a million other things). But what's truly remarkable about Rebecca Skloot 's book is that we also get the rest of the story, the part that could have easily remained hidden had she not spent ten years unearthing it: Who was Henrietta Lacks?
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"This was a great book that I'm so glad I read."
"In “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” Rebecca Skloot introduces us to the “real live woman,” the children who survived her, and the interplay of race, poverty, science and one of the most important medical discoveries of the last 100 years. Skloot narrates the science lucidly, tracks the racial politics of medicine thoughtfully and tells the Lacks family’s often painful history with grace. When science appears, it does so effortlessly, with explanations of cell anatomy or techniques like “fluorescence in situ hybridization” seamlessly worked into descriptions of the coloured wards of Johns Hopkins hospital to Lacks’s hometown of Clover, Virginia. And yet for all its grand scope, skilful writing and touching compassion, there is one simple element that makes As a final thought, I was struck by the parallels between Henrietta’s cells and her story."
"The author did a great job of allowing the reader to decide if Henrietta's family should have profited from her cells."
"After reading about Henrietta Lacks, I began thinking about all the blood tests I've had done, and some minor surgeries I've had and I constantly wondered, what did those doctors and/or hospitals do with my tissues and/or blood? I realize there are laws in place now that weren't there when Henrietta lived, but to read how Dr. Gey took samples of Henrietta's cancerous tumor and used it to advance science and medicine as we know of it today, is mind-boggling. All of us living today should be thankful for Henrietta because she has done something that no one else seems to ever have been able to do, which is live immortally. Lacks' cells, while her family continues to live in poverty. I learned so much about cells and DNA, not to mention that just about every pill I've ever taken, most likely was the result of Henrietta's cells, which still grow today."
"When a friend recommended this book I'd never heard of Henrietta Lacks or HeLa."
Best Botany
In this international bestseller, forester and author Peter Wohlleben convincingly makes the case that, yes, the forest is a social network. Peter Wohlleben spent over twenty years working for the forestry commission in Germany before leaving to put his ideas of ecology into practice.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"At this job, he was expected to produce as many high quality saw logs as possible, with maximum efficiency, by any means necessary. Luckily, he made friends in the community of Hümmel, and was given permission to manage their forest in a less destructive manner. In one portion of the forest, old trees are leased as living gravestones, where families can bury the ashes of kin. The book is built on a foundation of reputable science, but it reads like grandpa chatting at fireside. He’s a gentle old storyteller explaining the wondrous magic of beautiful forests to befuddled space aliens from a crazy planet named Consume. Their root systems intermingle, allowing them to send nutrients to their hungry children, and to ailing neighbors. When a Douglas fir is struck by lightning, several of its close neighbors might also die, because of their underground connections. Analyzing the rings of their trunks, they learned that the pines that survived a climate that warmed 42°F, and then cooled about the same amount — in a period of just 30 years! Dinosaurs still exist in the form of birds, winged creatures that can quickly escape from hostile conditions. (Far more questionable is the future of corn, wheat, and rice, whose genetic diversity has been sharply reduced by the seed sellers of industrial agriculture.). They unfold in the spring, capture sunlight, and for several months manufacture sugar, cellulose, and other carbohydrates. When the tree can store no more sugar, or when the first hard frost arrives, the solar panels are no longer needed. Now, with bare branches, the tree is far less vulnerable to damage from strong winds, heavy wet snows, and ice storms. In addition to rotting leaves, a wild forest also transforms fallen branches and trunks into carbon rich humus. By the end, readers are likely to imagine that undisturbed forests are vastly more intelligent than severely disturbed communities of radicalized consumers. More and more, scientists are muttering and snarling, as the imaginary gulf between the plant and animal worlds fades away. Wohlleben is not a vegetarian, because experience has taught him that plants are no less alive, intelligent, and sacred than animals."
"Review The Hidden Life of Trees Peter Wohlleben. The Hidden Life of Trees” is an amazing book presenting trees as sentient, purposeful beings living in dynamic relationship with each other. This single fact has hidden the true life of the trees from us. “The Hidden Life of Trees” is carefully and well presented with humor, with gentleness, with compassion, with joy, even with love."
"He outlines how trees work in terms of light and water, their intricate relationship and co-dependence with the mushroom family. How they communicate, how they deal with pests and warn nearby trees of danger, how they even feed and support each other. These are very human characteristics and we share them with most animals as they are necessary to stop us killing ourselves as we learn to move about our environment and also to make choices. But it is hard to see how they would be of any advantage to a sessile tree with limited options, and so there is no obvious reason to think they would have evolved in plants."
"Wohlleben is a charming guide to magical, but very real, world."
"Live on a tree-filled island in the summer and have always "felt" the companionship of the trees but thought I was crazy."
Best Biology of Animals
Specially designed for experienced colorists, Owls and other Creative Haven® adult coloring books offer an escape to a world of inspiration and artistic fulfillment. Marjorie Sarnat is a New York Times bestselling author and illustrator of several coloring books and more than a dozen books on art and creativity.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"The pages of the book are single-sided and are perforated at the bound edge so you can remove the page to color or to frame afterwards. The images have a wide range, including: an owl sitting on a wildly decorated crescent moon, an owl with butterflies, a "smart" owl amongst his/her books, owls on a wooden rocking horse, pirate owls, fairy tale owl, totem pole owls, steampunk owl, the owl and the pussycat (yes, cat included!)."
"She has filled this book with Charming Owls that entrance you and entwined them with intricate, captivating, unparalleled combinations of patterns, embellishing the backgrounds, scenery, borders, and even adorning the Owls creating illustrations that will make this your favorite coloring book, and you won’t be able to put it down. All Markers and Gel Pens leak through the pages so place two pieces of paper under the page you are coloring to prevent damage to the next page. If you love this book, you will also want to look at Marjoie Sarnats first coloring book (Creative Haven Cats)."
"This is a really cute and charming coloring book perfect for owl aficionados and colorists who like quirky pictures."
"The attached photos show a page from this book colored with the Sharpie Ultra-Fine Tip 24 pack markers and the very minimal bleed-through."
"I love owls so I'm probably bias about this coloring book."
"Markers will bleed through, but that's easy to fix with a couple of sheets of paper behind that one your coloring."
"This makes using water colored pencils and markers easier as they do not bleed through to the other picture. I do put another piece of paper or thin cardboard in between so that it also helps to catch the bleeding if I am being heavy handed."
Best Bioelectricity Science
Robert O. Becker, a pioneer in the filed of regeneration and its relationship to electrical currents in living things, challenges the established mechanistic understanding of the body. Robert O. Becker, M.D., lived in upstate New York.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Very good and interesting book."
"Western and Eastern Esoterisicm for centuries has taught, both subtly and obviously, that our bodies, our planet, our solar system, and our universe are essentially circuits. I love this book because it speaks our modern-day language and brings ancient, esoteric conceptions down to a level most people can at least attempt to grasp. It sounds like science fiction now ... 3) Peer review is flawed and riddled with sleazy people who steal ideas and find ways to back stab. This really isn't new information if you work in the "publish or perish" workforce, but it's refreshing to see another brave soul blow the horn on this bureaucratic creature from the black lagoon that repeatedly gets love letters from universities across the globe. If you stand outside the status quo in your thinking, you are thrown out, your research is stolen, and somebody privately uses the results to produce things for self-serving industries."
"I first read this as a library book after seeing it cited in many a bibliography, and quickly realized that I must own a copy for my own collection. The Body Electric is considered a classic in the field of bio-field research, and for good reason: Becker was one of the first to realize that our bodies are semiconductors of electricity."
"We can make our own Organic Dietary Silica Powder (as a liquid) by adding a trace amount of silver. I learned this by testing upon my own body some of the knowledge resulting from the research of Dr. Robert O. Becker, MD, an orthopedic surgeon and professor of same, who has a patent for wound care: United States patent # 5814094, and a book: The Body Electric: Electromagnetism And The Foundation Of Life. Orthosilicic acid nourishes the body to stimulate its production of collagen - connective tissue. When trace silver is present, collagen forms stem cells at the skin and pericardial sac surrounding the heart resulting in spontaneous regeneration of whatever is deficient within the body of greatest need. In a Circleware Circle 64 oz Pitcher, add distilled water, low magnesium earth salt (such as extra fine The Spice Lab's Pure Himalayan Salt - 10 Pounds - Finely Ground .5mm - not sea salt), Diatomaceous Earth Food Grade 10 Lb, and optionally a bicarbonate of either 1 lb USP Pure Sodium Bicarbonate Powder Highest Quality Food Grade Pure Baking Soda or Potassium Bicarbonate - 1 lb. Cut and shape two electrodes out of LifeForce 72" Colloidal Silver Generator Wire 9999 Pure 14 Gauge to overhang into the pitcher along opposite sides all the way to the bottom, and form a tiny curl at the bottom end so as to avoid scratching the inside surface of the glass. Run the colloidal silver generator on its lowest setting continuously for a few days and make sure your machine is capable of stirring the solution. EarthWorksHealth.com >> diatomaceous earth, food grade. [...]. Hanna Instruments HI 770 Checker HC Handheld Colorimeter, For Silica High Range. Dr. Becker has a patent for the use of silver in wound care at this location: [...]. Also see the photo documentation of Dr. Pramod Vora who has replicated one of Dr. Becker's treatment methods: space-age.com. There is also a clinic in Australia which has been successful in treating cancer with Becker's technique: [...]. My effort at researching Dr. Becker: [...]. Apart from drinking beer, there are very few conventional options in the standard western diet for supplementing ourselves with bioavailable silica for promoting collagen production in the human and animal body. When combined with minute quantities of silver (acting as a catalytic binding agent to collagen), bioavailable silica stimulates the production of non-differentiated (stem) cells at the growth layer of the skin and at the pericardial sac (surrounding the heart) supplementing whatever level of stem cells are already being produced by our bone marrow. - PubMed - NCBI. [...]. Silicon deprivation decreases collagen formation in wounds and bone, and ornithine transaminase enzyme activity in liver. - PubMed - NCBI. [...]. The only caveat to the regeneration of the body is the tendency for regeneration to drain the body of its alkaline reserve. Thus, is needed: silica to balance the body's pH plus plenty of alkalizing supplements and methods, such as: the magnesium and calcium products cited above or others (such as: Bone Meal Kal 250 Tabs and magnesium malate or citrate), Starwest Botanicals Organic Kelp Powder, 1 Pound Bags,Celtic Sea Salt, Fine Ground, 16 Ounce and electrolyte powder, Sleep Lavender Bath Salts 2 Lbs, etc. I think bioavailable silica plus trace silver (in any form) holds the key to my recovery."
Best Zoology
The lush and unique photography in this book represents National Geographic's Photo Ark, a major initiative and lifelong project by photographer Joel Sartore to make portraits of the world's animals—especially those that are endangered. He has written several books including National Geographic's Rare: Portraits of America's Endangered Species , Photographing Your Family , and Let's Be Reasonable , a collection of essays from the CBS Sunday Morning show.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"She loves the book."
"Gorgeous, large tabletop book."
"Beautiful book!"
"Absolutely amazing pictures and incredible record of species on our planet!"
"Beautiful beautiful book."
"EXCELLENT. 25 YRS OF WORK IN ATTEMPT TO PHOTO AND RECORD ENDANGERED SPECIE ON THI PLANET."
"Beautiful photos as are all NG photos."
"This book is beautiful!"
Best Ecology
A major book about the future of the world, blending intellectual and natural history and field reporting into a powerful account of the mass extinction unfolding before our eyes Over the last half-billion years, there have been Five mass extinctions, when the diversity of life on earth suddenly and dramatically contracted. Ms. Kolbert shows in these pages that she can write with elegiac poetry about the vanishing creatures of this planet, but the real power of her book resides in the hard science and historical context she delivers here, documenting the mounting losses that human beings are leaving in their wake.” ― The New York Times. “Natural scientists posit that there have been five extinction events in the Earth's history (think of the asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs), and Kolbert makes a compelling case that human activity is leading to the sixth.” ― Bill Gates. “[Kolbert] grounds her stories in rigorous science and memorable characters past and present, building a case that a mass extinction is underway, whether we want to admit it or not.” ― Discover Magazine. “The factoids Kolbert tosses off about nature's incredible variety--a frog that carries eggs in its stomach and gives birth through its mouth, a wood stork that cools off by defecating on its own legs--makes it heartbreakingly clear, without any heavy-handed sermonizing from the author, just how much we lose when an animal goes extinct. In the same way, her intrepid reporting from far-off places--Panama, Iceland, Italy, Scotland, Peru, the Amazonian rain forest of Brazil, and the remote one tree Island, off the coast of Australia--gives us a sense of the earth's vastness and beauty.” ― Bookforum. “Kolbert accomplishes an amazing feat in her latest book, which superbly blends the depressing facts associated with rampant species extinctions and impending ecosystem collapse with stellar writing to produce a text that is accessible, witty, scientifically accurate, and impossible to put down.” ― Publishers Weekly (starred review). “Rendered with rare, resolute, and resounding clarity, Kolbert's compelling and enlightening report forthrightly addresses the most significant topic of our lives.” ― Booklist (starred review). Like Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, Elizabeth Kolbert's The Sixth Extinction is destined to become one of the most important and defining books of our time.” ― David Grann, author of The Lost City of Z. Her long view of extinction excited my joy in life's diversity -- even as she made me aware how many species are currently at risk.” ― Dava Sobel, author of Longitude and Galileo's Daughter. “With her usual lucid and lovely prose, Elizabeth Kolbert lays out the sad and gripping facts of our moment on earth: that we've become a geological force, driving vast swaths of creation over the brink.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Along the way, other startling observations emerge: biodiversity is declining not only due to the "old causes" such as hunted to extinction for various reasons but also new ones such as global warming impact on life-sustaining ranges, the loss of habitat space, the inability to regenerate a species due to slower reproduction rate and the rapid vulnerability to new diseases (fungal, bacterial or viral). In the prior roughly 500 million years there have been upwards of 25 periods of species extinction, of which five are considered to have been major ones due to breadth and probably rate of surrounding change. Nearly all of these were due to factors beyond the control of the inhabitants at the time: changes in chemical balances, glaciations and global warming due to Earth orbit wobbles, volcanic eruptions and asteroid impact leading to global cooling that killed off many of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago. At a speed of change far beyond anything that has happened before - be it global warming by burning millions of years of fossil fuels, by eliminating living space on land or in sea for other species, or by sheer carelessness."
"One con to some people would be that the book does not end like a regular fiction book but it simply ends like all the other chapters ended in the book. but this book truly gives a look into the reality of our future environment and of many people/scientists who have dedicated much of their life to preserving the diversity of life."
"This is a fascinating book, and I am really just joining the chorus of readers who have appreciated the research and excellent presentation by the author."
"You can quickly sum up the man made behaviors that are creating the Sixth Extinction: global warming, destruction of habitat and the Columbian exchange."
"Instead of long expositions on the key points of various studies and voluminous research, the author personalizes the information with profiles of, and introductions to, dedicated people working in the field today."
"This book takes you through a series of vignettes and focuses less on the politics of today than on the quest to understand our planet and the special role played by our species."
Best Anatomy
For more than 35 years, The Anatomy Coloring Book has been the #1 best-selling human anatomy coloring book! Immediately recognizing the potential of this method, Dr. Elson encouraged Kapit to do a “complete” coloring book on anatomy and offered to collaborate on the project. The first edition of The Anatomy Coloring Book was published in 1977, and its immediate success inspired the development of a completely new field of publishing: educational coloring books. In the early 1990s, Kapit wrote and designed The Geography Coloring Book, now in its second edition. This is his seventh text, having authored It’s Your Body and The Zoology Coloring Book and co-authored The Human Brain Coloring Book and The Microbiology Color. ing Book. Dr. Elson was assistant professor of anatomy at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, participated in the development of the Physician’s Assistant Program, lectured and taught dissection anatomy at the University of California School of Medicine in San Francisco, and taught general anatomy, from protozoons to humans, at City College of San Francisco.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"IMPORTANT: Make sure you READ ALL the information in the section labeled "INTRODUCTION TO COLORING" BEFORE you start coloring your first page. For example, I chose Red, Orange and Yellow for the "Levators"; 2 colors of Blue for the "Zygomaticus Major" and "Zygomaticus Minor"' and 2 shades of Brown for the "Depressors" (page 44). NOTE: I realize this takes extra time planning your colors, but it really makes it easier to memorize when there is a consistant plan in place for what the colors visually symbolize."
"It's a great learning tool for all ages."
"Very informative, and makes things a bit more fun."
"I bought this coloring book for my girlfriend when she started massage school."
"I didn't want to spend a couple $100 on another textbook when I took a summer anatomy class, but thankfully I heard about this textbook from other students and thought $15 is better than hundreds."
"My only critique is that I wish the words and pictures were a little bigger, but overall great educational coloring book."
"The only thing I would say that might be negative is that the older versions had pictures that were larger, but I realize there is so much more information they have put into the book."
"Much more difficult than anticipated...in a good/challenging way."
Best Paleontology
Dinosaurs Are Forever A pictorial history of paleoart. It was 1830 when an English scientist named Henry De la Beche painted the first piece of paleoart, a dazzling, deliciously macabre vision of prehistoric reptiles battling underwater. “One of the most extraordinary and beautiful volumes on the topic yet conceived.” ( The Economist 1843, London ).
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"Recent decades have produced torrents of it, and off the top of my head I can name many contemporary paleoartists: Mauricio Anton, Julius Csotonyi, John Gurche, James Gurney, Doug Henderson, Raul Martin, Gregory S. Paul, Luis Rey, William Stout, Peter Trusler. This painting depicts life in the Jurassic based on fossils from Lyme Regis on the Dorset coast of England. Ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, fish, and pterosaurs, are shown in violent interaction, with crinoids, squids, and ammonites in the background. Therefore, their restoration was heavily influenced by modern reptiles; they were depicted as a mix of giant lizard, crocodile, and rhinoceros (all quadrupeds). Megalosaurus was drawn as a shortened ridged-back crocodile with a frog-like mouth full of sharp teeth (we now know it was a bipedal theropod). The first reason is that painter and sculptor Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins (1807-1894) designed public exhibits of prehistoric life for Victorian audiences in England, particularly life-size models of dinosaurs as they were understood at the time. He established a studio in New York and had planned a “Paleozoic Museum” for Central Park, similar to the Crystal Palace. The second reason for a boost in paleoart is that the American west was being explored by famous paleontologists, especially the rivals Edward Cope and O.C. Clearly the dinosaurs in early movies like “King Kong” and “The Lost World” were copied from his paintings, and almost all the current paleoartists say that they were inspired by his work. A very interesting detail about Knight is that he was legally blind for most of his life and needed assistance to complete large works like murals. The most famous (and probably the largest, at 110 feet long) single work of paleoart is probably “The Age of Reptiles” which is a fresco mural at the Peabody museum at Yale. The mural depicts several dozen species of reptiles walking through a detailed environment which appears to be shimmering with light. Zdenek Burian (1905-1981), a Czech artist who worked in the period 1930’s to the 1980’s, is probably the most prolific paleoartist; it is estimated he produced somewhere over 15,000 paintings and sketches. My favorite work shows an aquarium view of two Brachiosaurus neck deep in water (although we now know sauropods were generally land animals, and it would be physiologically impossible to breath in such a situation). Heinrich Harder (1858-1935) is known for painting collectable cards of prehistoric life that were distributed by one of Germany’s leading chocolate manufacturers in 1916. Those of us who follow the literature about the dinosaur origin of birds often hear about the horrible wrong turn the field took because of a book published by Gerhard Heilmann (1859-1946) in Danish in 1916 and in English in 1926: “The Origin of Birds.” In this book it is argued that dinosaurs could not be the ancestors of birds because they lacked wishbones. “Paleoart” discusses two English artists that I was only vaguely aware of, who worked in the 1950’s and 1960’s: Neave Parker (1910-1961) and Maurice Wilson (1914-1987). Parker did contrasty monochromatic “chalk and charcoal” paintings and Wilson imitated the soft style of Japanese watercolors. The most unfamiliar artists to me (and to most people in the West) are the “Soviet era” (1930’s-1980’s) Russians: Konstantin Konstantinovich Flyorov, Vassily Alexeyevich Vatagin, Alexei Nikanorovich Komarov, and Andrei Rostislavovich Lopatin. He had preference for saturated colors and Impressionistic brush technique, and he seemingly payed little attention to fossil evidence. The latest piece discussed in “Paleoart” is the 60 ft high ceramic mosaic “The Tree of Life” built in 1986 by Alexander Belashov (1933-) for the new Orlov Museum."
"The book is beautiful and was immediately loved by my stepson."
"Amazing book showing and detailing the art bringing prehistoric life ( dinosaurs) alive visually!"
"I love the evolution of dinosaur art through the years."
"Paleoart is a visually stunning book. The subject of the book is the deceptions themselves, and the artists behind them."
Best Plants in Biological Sciences
In this international bestseller, forester and author Peter Wohlleben convincingly makes the case that, yes, the forest is a social network. Peter Wohlleben spent over twenty years working for the forestry commission in Germany before leaving to put his ideas of ecology into practice.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"At this job, he was expected to produce as many high quality saw logs as possible, with maximum efficiency, by any means necessary. Luckily, he made friends in the community of Hümmel, and was given permission to manage their forest in a less destructive manner. In one portion of the forest, old trees are leased as living gravestones, where families can bury the ashes of kin. The book is built on a foundation of reputable science, but it reads like grandpa chatting at fireside. He’s a gentle old storyteller explaining the wondrous magic of beautiful forests to befuddled space aliens from a crazy planet named Consume. Their root systems intermingle, allowing them to send nutrients to their hungry children, and to ailing neighbors. When a Douglas fir is struck by lightning, several of its close neighbors might also die, because of their underground connections. Analyzing the rings of their trunks, they learned that the pines that survived a climate that warmed 42°F, and then cooled about the same amount — in a period of just 30 years! Dinosaurs still exist in the form of birds, winged creatures that can quickly escape from hostile conditions. (Far more questionable is the future of corn, wheat, and rice, whose genetic diversity has been sharply reduced by the seed sellers of industrial agriculture.). They unfold in the spring, capture sunlight, and for several months manufacture sugar, cellulose, and other carbohydrates. When the tree can store no more sugar, or when the first hard frost arrives, the solar panels are no longer needed. Now, with bare branches, the tree is far less vulnerable to damage from strong winds, heavy wet snows, and ice storms. In addition to rotting leaves, a wild forest also transforms fallen branches and trunks into carbon rich humus. By the end, readers are likely to imagine that undisturbed forests are vastly more intelligent than severely disturbed communities of radicalized consumers. More and more, scientists are muttering and snarling, as the imaginary gulf between the plant and animal worlds fades away. Wohlleben is not a vegetarian, because experience has taught him that plants are no less alive, intelligent, and sacred than animals."
"Review The Hidden Life of Trees Peter Wohlleben. The Hidden Life of Trees” is an amazing book presenting trees as sentient, purposeful beings living in dynamic relationship with each other. This single fact has hidden the true life of the trees from us. “The Hidden Life of Trees” is carefully and well presented with humor, with gentleness, with compassion, with joy, even with love."
"Live on a tree-filled island in the summer and have always "felt" the companionship of the trees but thought I was crazy."
"He outlines how trees work in terms of light and water, their intricate relationship and co-dependence with the mushroom family. How they communicate, how they deal with pests and warn nearby trees of danger, how they even feed and support each other. These are very human characteristics and we share them with most animals as they are necessary to stop us killing ourselves as we learn to move about our environment and also to make choices. But it is hard to see how they would be of any advantage to a sessile tree with limited options, and so there is no obvious reason to think they would have evolved in plants."
"Wohlleben is a charming guide to magical, but very real, world."
Best Life Science Taxonomies
An essential addition to the gardener’s library, this colorful, fully illustrated book details the history of naming plants, provides an overview of Latin naming conventions, and offers guidelines for pronunciation. ( Martha Stewart Living ). “ Latin for Gardeners is useful, surprising, and beautiful—an accessible dictionary for everyone who puzzles over botanical identifications, an opportunity to get better acquainted with the extraordinary discoverers and namers of so many of our favorite plants, and a treat for all who enjoy the art and lore of the garden.”.
Reviews
Find Best Price at Amazon"As for those of you who are using this book to learn the Latin names of various plants, this book is well-suited for that."
"This makes it easier for me to remember because often the names are related to a characteristic, color or country of origin of the plant."
"Helpful in differentiating Latin for my studies in horticulture."
"The only thing the book lacks is an index of English names for the plants."
"gave this as a gift to my daughter who is a professional gardener and she's getting miles out of it :-)."
"Good tool for horticulture student or long time gardener."
"This is a fabulous resource that anyone who has a garden should own."